Types of Honors Courses

There are many ways that faculty members can work with Honors students to enhance
their pathway through the university. These experiences not only enrich students'
educations, they can be quite invigorating for faculty members as well. Some
available options for faculty members are listed below. Please contact the
Honors College
Dean or
Assistant Dean, or work with your department chair to determine the best
option for you.

Types of Honors Courses

Traditional/Regular Honors Course: Honors sections of traditional
courses are typically restricted to Honors students (though exceptions can
be made for high-achieving students who are not enrolled in the Honors College).
Most Honors courses at WVU are capped at 25 students, and are
developed to contain some particular enrichment component to the course.

Honors Add-on Course: Honors add-on courses are 1- or 0-credit courses associated
with a larger lecture course. By design, they enrich the larger course
externally by breaking out Honors students into a smaller setting in order to delve
deeper into the subject matter and complete significant additional assignments
for independent or group work. Students register for both the regular course
as well as the dedicated Honors add-on section for that particular class.

Cross-listed Honors Section: For smaller courses that do not have a critical
mass of Honors students to support a whole section, a cross-listed course can
provide an option to add enriched content for a smaller segment of the whole
course. For example, a course that usually enrolls 50 could have section
001 enroll 45 students and section H01 enroll 5 Honors students. Both sections
meet together, but the Honors section has a different syllabus with an additional
enriched component. Ideally, such sections would also provide an opportunity
for Honors students to collaborate or interact in some meaningful way.

Contract Course
: For students to
contract a course as Honors, a student works with a faculty member to supplement
a regular with individualized Honors material. It is the student’s responsibility
to meet with the faculty member and set this up in a timely manner. Applications
for the contract course must be submitted to the Honors Office by the first half
of the semester.

International Study/Study Abroad: Students who do a study abroad experience
(defined as outside the fifty US states) for WVU may apply to have this count
as Honors credit. Since we want to encourage study abroad, these petitions are
almost always approved. Students are asked to keep a journal (or online blog)
and write a reflection paper about their time abroad to document the experience.
Faculty-led programs can facilitate this credit by building this work into the
syllabus.

Independent Study/ Undergraduate Research: One-semester or summer experiences
for credit that have a strong academic component and are in some way out of the
ordinary are eligible to count for Honors credit. Typically, credit under 495
and 497 common course numbers are eligible
to apply for Honors credits, though other course numbers can host such experiences
as well.

Summer Guided Reading: Summer guided reading courses are most frequently
taken by students who are second semester admits or students who need to catch
up on Honors hours for one reason or another. These courses are offered over
the summer and students most often do not need to be on campus to take the class.
Each summer guided reading course varies depending on the subject and the instructor.

Thesis/Senior Project
:Students on the Presidential Honors track (admitted Fall 2016 or earlier)
have
many options to complete an Honors thesis/senior project, several of which
require dedicated faculty advising. Students admitted Fall 2017 an after
will have an opportunity to apply for the new upper division Honors program to
begin in Fall 2019. This program will revolve around a central student-designed,
multi-semester experiential learning opportunity via study abroad, undergraduate
research, or internship.